Plagued: The Ironville Zombie Quarantine Retraction Experiment (Plagued States of America Book 3) Read Online Free PDF

camera, no joining up,” Jones said emphatically.
    “And a gun,” the doctor added , ignoring the soldier. “I want my own gun.”
    “No gun, no nothing.”
    “Alright, you two. Can it,” Hank interrupted.
    “We’ll talk about this later,” Jones told her.
    “I’m going,” she replied defiantly.
    “Can it!” Hank grumbled before Jones could speak. He turned toward Tom. “Can you imagine being on the duck with these two for four days?”
    “I’m sure I’m going to find out,” Tom replied. “Are you coming?”
    “I want the same deal you made with Peske,” Hank said, squinting one eye toward Tom.
    “You don’t even know what that was.”
    “It was good enough for Peske. Are you still good for it?”
    “Deal,” Tom said, holding out a hand. Hank shook it firmly, nodding.
    “Great,” M.B. Houston said as he clapped his hands together loudly to get everyone’s attention. “Now, who’s going to drive me out to my engine so we can get this show on the road?”
     

Five
    Tom and Penelope sat in the Subaru with the engine running, waiting for M.B. Houston to come out of the coach. Houston said he wanted to get the soldier to sign a contract before leaving. Tom decided it would speed things along if he went and got the car. They sat idling, waiting for Houston to come out of the coach. Penelope sat behind the passenger seat, hunched as low as she could get, her chin inside her coat, glaring at Tom’s reflection in the rearview mirror.
    “Don’t look at me like that,” Tom said softly.
    “No go,” Penelope huffed. She managed to make the sign of danger while fending off the cold with one hand tucked under her armpit. There was no warming button on the back seats.
    “I know it’s dangerous,” Tom replied.
    Penelope didn’t stop her signing, talking over his words. Woman watching me .
    “Who? The doctor?”
    Penelope nodded.
    “She is a little too interested in half-breeds, huh?” Tom said, turning in his seat to look back at Penelope directly. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep an eye on her. Anything else?”
    “Hess,” she hissed, signing zombie, smell, man .
    “ Yuh,” Tom told her, trying to correct her pronunciation. “Yuh-ess. Say it again.”
    “Man,” she replied obstinately, pointing out the front window.
    M.B. Houston, the man who smelled like zombies, was coming. Tom turned around to see Houston zipping up a jacket as he walked toward the car. Houston waved in at Penelope as he passed by the hood, a big grin on his face.
    “This is going to be no fun at all,” Tom told Penelope under his breath.
    “What are you driving this thing for?” Houston asked as he climbed into the passenger seat. “Shouldn’t you have a Jeep or something bigger? You’re Chief Registrar. Go grab a Hummer.”
    “This has better ground clearance, and better gas mileage,” Tom replied as he backed the vehicle up to turn it toward the main gate.
    “We’re not going very far,” Houston told him.
    Tom drove them across the gravel field from the rail cars to the main gate and stopped next to a guard house. The door opened and a uniformed soldier in solid black stepped out. Tom rolled down his window with his arm hanging out.
    “Afternoon, sir,” the soldier said as he scanned Tom’s arm through his jacket. “ Heading out again, huh? Going anyplace special?”
    “Actually,” Tom replied. “We’re going to go get a train engine. Can you call Chuck and have him move the cargo I asked for onto one of the well-cars?”
    “I’ll give him a call,” the soldier said , looking up at the crane operator cockpit eighty feet above the EPS. The crane was used for moving goods onto the EPS, including the zombies held in the kennels down here on the ground. ‘Yup, he’s in there,” the soldier said, nodding.
    The soldier walked around to the other side of the vehicle and scanned both Houston’s and Penelope’s arms. “Are you sure you want to take your lady friend out there, sir?” He leaned down